Netflix in deal to pay Verizon for faster access - Reuters

(Reuters) - Netflix Inc (NFLX.O) has reached a deal to pay Verizon Communications Inc (VZ.N) for faster delivery of its TV shows and movies, the second arrangement to pay fees for quicker access that the company argues should be free.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

In February, Netflix struck a deal with Comcast Corp (CMCSA.O) to pay for faster delivery over the Internet through a practice known as interconnection. Weeks later, Netflix Chief Executive Reed Hastings said he had reluctantly agreed to pay the fees so his customers would get better service.

Netflix (Reluctantly) in deal to pay Verizon for faster access - Reuters

I have no idea where this could end up, but instead of an open internet and progress for humanity, we may end up with a partitioned internet similar to pay-to-play games in the worst case scenario.

Notice that Netflix, a major player, was bent over backwards by Verizon in an example of a corporation with its own interests in mind "taking out" a corporation with more valiant interests in mind - that precedent could become a pattern - of course, Netflix would want to not have to pay a premium price for its delivery of streaming video.

But at the same time, Verizon basically blackmailed Netflix into paying more for a service that it already paid for. Netflix was not getting a free lunch, Netflix was paying for their lunch.

On the other hand, Netflix got an all right deal out of a decaying situation because now they know that they aren't going to have their services sabotaged in more blackmail attempts.

However, this is similar to how a crime ring in a big city, such as the Mafia, extorts a store for money by offering them the chance to pay for "protection services."

We are entering dark times, and I am not going to be afraid to report on it guys. I will try to keep you informed of the best arguments against some of the tyranny we face in the future and some of the best links, if I can, to keep you on top of your game.

Meanwhile, could this affect the consumer with higher Netflix rates or partitioned coverage? I'm guessing so.

Especially with corporations being able to pour nearly unlimited money into our "legal system" and "political system" in the form of bribes and campaign donations.

Check out this older new piece as well:

WASHINGTON — The principle that all Internet content should be treated equally as it flows through cables and pipes to consumers looks all but dead.

The Federal Communications Commission said on Wednesday that it would propose new rules that allow companies like Disney, Google or Netflix to pay Internet service providers like Comcast and Verizon for special, faster lanes to send video and other content to their customers.

The proposed changes would affect what is known as net neutrality — the idea that no providers of legal Internet content should face discrimination in providing offerings to consumers, and that users should have equal access to see any legal content they choose.

F.C.C. to Abandon Net Neutrality Rules

It's not like Netflix needed to have faster access, I've always found Netflix to be solid as a rock. But I guess this is just another example of "My way or the highway" that seems so common in big business.

Well a free internet was nice while it existed. Now it's off to a communication experience sponsored by whoever paid the highest.

I wonder how that will eventually work for the average sites? After all, I distinctly recall the days when they said ATM's would never cost money to use. How silly, they insisted. It saved labor, they explained, so never a thing to charge for.

So I do wonder...after the top players are paying their tribute for the ability to come above low muddy speeds or other means of motivating payment, how far down will they take it before figuring they've tapped out the new market?

I guess this is Internet 2.5? 3.0? Progress sucks in this case.

a reply to: Wrabbit2000

Sucks to be in the US then but I cannot say I am surprised in a country where money rules.

In other news, the EU has approved a bill guaranteeing net neutrality

So, it remains to be seen if this move in the US will remain permanent or whether the US will eventually follow common sense. It might end up with the US being isolated in the world on this, which may lead to a mass migration of services out of US data centres to regions where they don't have to pay premium rates to get their traffic moved.

As I work in Comms, I can see why the telco's want neutrality scrapped. Services such as Netflix etc will consume huge amounts of bandwidth. On the flip side, however, I know we (Vodafone) charge through the nose for high bandwidth services anyway, giving customers dedicated DWDM systems etc, so there are ways to manage this huge traffic flow without compromising net neutrality.

Here's a video from last week. Net Neutrality died last week...





He states that Verizon was whining about how Netflix was taking up too much bandwidth. Therefore I don't think this deal means that people who have Verizon would get faster streaming speeds on Netflix. The deal was made so that Verizon wouldn't slow down how much bandwidth Netflix can take up. So I think this isn't really a bad thing.


The only bad thing is that just like every corporation out there, this is going to soon start being abused.

Goodbye Net Neutrality!

originally posted by: RichAwake
It's not like Netflix needed to have faster access, I've always found Netflix to be solid as a rock. But I guess this is just another example of "My way or the highway" that seems so common in big business.

You don't understand. They bill it for PR purposes as faster access, and in reality it is because they'll get 1% faster speeds or something. Had they not paid, their service would have been slowed to the point that it was unusable.

How sad that these telecom companies are leaving the responsibility of providing their product to another company.

How sad.

If I would have been Netflix I simply would have taken this case all the way to the supreme court and won a net neutrality ruling. Which would have been amazing for future cases of big companies like Verizon and Comcast, trying to pin their costs on others.

It's bad enough they gouge their customers for internet usage already, now they wanna target the internet services that people are using.

~Tenth

This is really a non issue. WHY? Because the wireless internet coming online in a year or so. It will give us two internets,one for the masses and one for the elites.

originally posted by: yuppa
This is really a non issue. WHY? Because the wireless internet coming online in a year or so. It will give us two internets,one for the masses and one for the elites.

What are you talking about?

~Tenth

a reply to: tothetenthpower


The Outernet

THAT is what I am talking about. That is to replace the regular internet. Next year sometime.

originally posted by: yuppa
a reply to: tothetenthpower


The Outernet

THAT is what I am talking about. That is to replace the regular internet. Next year sometime.

That will not be nearly as productive as you think it would be. Meshnets that connect cities as local communities, and then connect to satellites would be more effective.

TPB proposed a system a couple years ago actually using solar powered radio transmitters to create a global pirate network. That never went anywhere either.

Focus on what can be done with the tools available now, not what someone looking for investors claims they can do in the future.

Btw, internet that looks like tv broadcasting is the last thing you want. Unless you just plan to watch tv.

a reply to: yuppa

Well, that article clearly states that the "outernet" is to provide wireless internet to rural communities and those who don't have other access, so not sure why you've leapt the extraordinary conclusion that one is for the "elites".

Anyhoo, it also clearly states that the sat's communicate to base stations, so this isn't an independent network, it is still going to be connected to the "internet", not that the "internet" even exists anyway.

From my view on this rock, Verizon has been throttling my internet since I dropped them for cable and picked up Netflix.
I've had solid internet service forever and never had an issue, now it seems as though I'm being starved for bandwidth even though my specs exceed the requirements for good service from Netflix.

I hope this is a turning point for an agreement because it seems both companies are pointing fingers at whose to blame for shoddy service.

originally posted by: shadow watcher
From my view on this rock, Verizon has been throttling my internet since I dropped them for cable and picked up Netflix.
I've had solid internet service forever and never had an issue, now it seems as though I'm being starved for bandwidth even though my specs exceed the requirements for good service from Netflix.

I hope this is a turning point for an agreement because it seems both companies are pointing fingers at whose to blame for shoddy service.

This practice used to be illegal it's specifically what Net Neutrality existed to stop. They couldn't throttle you based on the type of data you were downloading. Thanks to overturning that part of Net Neutrality about 1.5 years ago however ISP's can do this. Their goal is to charge the website a fee for internet access and a fee for non crippling speeds. The customer then pays a fee for internet access, and a fee to get proper speeds on each type of data they want... webpages, email, video, music, etc.

You can thank the FCC for the new regulations as well as the Republicans and media lobby groups in pushing for these new rules. It's going to take 5 years from now for us to be one of the worst in the world when it comes to tech due to these laws. A big change from our rapidly diminishing status as the leader.

It's going to take 5 years from now for us to be one of the worst in the world when it comes to tech due to these laws.

By then I'll probably be using satellite internet and dumping the local competition for a more open market.
Things need to change and the net neutrality was the first step to alerting the masses that we are seriously lacking.

a reply to: Aazadan

Do you have any idea how crappy wireless internet is at that kind of range? Do you know the cost of developing these things?

Along with the technological gaps and issues with providing long range signal to even the most rural or urban of places? It's insanely expensive and difficult to do.

This hasn't had a proof of concept yet. It would be like 1 to 30MBps max, while the cabled fiber connections run in the Gigabits per second.

See how silly it would for them to move to a less efficient, less reliable and more expensive form of internet?

This whole elites are taking over the internet is hogwash. There are more skilled hackers than there are rich people and if they internet ever did come under 'attack' all hell would break loose.

~Tenth

originally posted by: tothetenthpower
a reply to: Aazadan

Do you have any idea how crappy wireless internet is at that kind of range? Do you know the cost of developing these things?

Yes, I'm completely aware and it's still more realistic than what the person I was responding to was talking about.

The next big internet providing breakthrough will be with whitefi which should already be out but is being held up for who knows what reason. That solves the last mile issue with rural areas quite well.

By then I'll probably be using satellite internet and dumping the local competition for a more open market.
Things need to change and the net neutrality was the first step to alerting the masses that we are seriously lacking.

You do realize satellite can never seriously compete right? There's an 800ms speed of light delay that cannot be overcome other than by using science to increase the speed of light. In addition to that satellite is primarily a download only service, upload tends to go through a land line which requires infrastructure to be built, and is typically quite slow, much slower than cable or dsl. Basically, the more interactive the content the less viable satellite is.

Satellite companies require the same local infrastructure as other ISP's, and due to the immense costs, territory gets divided up the same way the ISP's divide territory up in order to prevent competition. Satellite gets the area cable doesn't want to run.

Removing Net Neutrality did nothing to increase your options as a consumer, infact it reduced them. There was no Net Neutrality provision that said ISP's get to be local monopolies, however because they are they can charge whatever they want for service now and no one will be able to put up the capital to expand. Remember, these companies didn't even build the infrastructure in the first place. We did with tax dollars, then we gave it to the ISP's in exchange for a certain quality of service at a certain price point. They took the hardware and went back on the deal. It would cost several hundred billion dollars to make another network for other companies to use.

ISP's should be public utilities and they should not be allowed to discriminate based on data type.